'Mr Monkey calls it a day so he can return home to enjoy his retirement'

It’s been nearly a year since Mr Monkey burst on to the local political scene with the redesigned version of Mr Monkey’s Blog

.. and what a year it’s been.

This chimp had no idea of the effect his blog would have on politicians of all parties and senior council officers or the impact it would have on local politcs.

Mr Monkey quickly built up a following amongst local bloggers and within weeks, Mr Monkey’s Blog established itself as South Tyneside’s premier blog, much to the annoyance of some.

There have been many highlights during the last 12 months but Mr Monkey’s favourites are:-

Ending councillor David Potts political career before it started by getting him deselected as the Tory candidate to fight Alistair Darling.

Ensuring that the people of Washington East and Houghton knew what a devious and scheming individual Ed Malcom was. This played a major part in his failure to become their prospective member of Parliament.

Exposing council leader Iain Malcolm as an election fraudster.

Knowing that Irene Lucas, the Chief Executive of South Tyneside Council could not control, manipulate or stop Mr Monkey and that his blog was the worst thing that happened to her in her local government career.

Knowing that every politician feared being exposed on Mr Monkey’s Blog and despite what they said, knowing that everyone of them read it daily.

Exposing Ed Malcolm’s long term affair with his ‘granny’, aka councillor Punchion

‘Outing’ Iain Malcolm.

Continually thwarting the attempts of senior council officials to stop Mr Monkey’s Blog and reveal the identity of Mr Monkey.

Exposing Papa John Szymanski, editor of the local Malcolm Fanzine, aka the Shields Gazette as a Labour groupie, freeloader and that he sold his soul to Labour for the price of a sausage roll.

Knowing that all the pseudonyms Mr Monkey has used will be around for years to come.

After achieving every goal Mr Monkey set himself – in record time – this chimp has decided to give his victims an early birthday present – Mr Monkey is going to call it a day on Thursday 30th July.

Mr Monkey has spent the last couple of months agonising over whether or not to retire and after talking it over with a few wiser chimps, he’s decided to take their advice and return to the jungle to enjoy his retirement and spend more time with his family.

Although Mr Monkey has decided to call it a day, he hasn’t yet made up his mind about whether to leave Mr Monkey’s Blog on the internet for future generations to enjoy or whether to remove it forever – that decision will be made on International Primate Day.

Make sure you stop by on Tuesday 1st September .. when all will be revealed.

Last week Mr Monkey published the findings of his investigation into ballot rigging by Labour council leader Iain Malcolm at the 2000 local elections.

At the time it was widely predicted that councillor Iain Malcolm would lose his seat to the Conservative candidate, Patricia Piggott so he took matter into his own hands by arranging for party members to collect postal votes from unsuspecting members of the public by offering to post them on their behalf.

Little did they know that he had no intention of posting them – not until he had ‘sorted’ them. He did this by opening the ed the postal vote envelopes, removing ballot papers and destroying the ones that had voted for the Conservative candidate. He then carefully resealed the ones that had voted for him and posted them back to the town hall. Councillor Malcolm’s fraudulent activities had ensured that he was declared the winner

Councillor Malcolm celebrated his ‘victory’ with a handful of associates who’d helped him secure his victory by either collecting postal votes, illegally completing them, opening them or destroying them. He even boasted that he’d cheated his way to victory by defeating the Conservative candidate.

After councilor Iain Malcolm was sworn in for another term the unsuspecting party members, Tom and Mary Taylor, who he’d cynically used to collect a large proportion of postal votes from the elderly and whose house he’d used to open the postal vote envelopes were finding it difficult to come to terms with what they had witnessed.

They were honest people with principles and high moral values who had been unwittingly dragged into Iain Malcolm’s plan to rig the ballot in his favour. This whole affair increasingly played on Tom’s mind and gradually his health started to deteriorate. Unfortunately Tom was torn between his loyalty to the movement, his duty as a party official (he was the local party treasurer) and his own consounce.

For months Tom agonised as to whether he should contact the police or confide in another party official but he didn’t know who he could trust after witnessing councillor Iain Malcolm ballot rigging in his own front room. Almost a year passed before the opportunity finally presented itself.

Tom’s ill health had prevented him from carrying out his duties as the party teasurer and it had also resulted in him missing a number of executive meetings. He was also unable to produce the treasure’s report for the South Shields Labour party’s Annual General Meeting (AGM) – something which the party’s constitution required.

At a meeting of the executive Iain Malcolm produced a treasure’s report for the AGM (without the knowledge of the treasure) and said that he would sign it off. Two members of the executive objected to this and said that this was unconstitutional, broke party rules and left the executive open to allegations of fraud.

One of the objectors Geraldine White said that she would visit Tom at his home to see if he was happy to sign off the report produced by Iain Malcolm and would report back. This was reluctantly agreed.

PARTY TREASURER, TOM TAYLOR REVEALS ALL– Part 3 of this disgraceful act of betrayal and election fraud will follow shortly.

'Hero worship - coun Iain Malcolm is set to join an exclusive club of election fraudsters headed by his political hero Robert Mugabe'

It seems Mr Monkey’s sudden disappearance has resulted in all kinds of speculation as to his whereabouts, with politicians, council officers and bloggers all left wondering what’s happened to this naughty chimp.

Mr Monkey reckons that for the last 7 days the borough’s political elite, senior council officers and Mr Grumpy, aka Papa John Szymanski at the Gazette have been hoping and praying that their nightmare was finally over and that the chimp’s sudden silence finally signalled the end of Mr Monkey’s Blog.

Sorry to disappoint you miserable bastards but nothing could be further from the truth – you’re nightmares are about to get a whole lot worse!

Mr Monkey took some time out to recharge his batteries, follow up a few interesting leads and finalise his investigations into the culture of election fraud in the local Labour party.

It seems that council leader Iain Malcolm has cheated his way to the top and that his unique vision of democracy in action wouldn’t be out of place in Zimbabwe.

Mr Monkey can now reveal that the results of his month long investigation into election fraud and ballot rigging in South Tyneside will be published tomorrow and he reckons that senior local Labour politicians won’t sleep too well tonight knowing what Mr Monkey is about to publish will expose many of their corrupt and devious practises which have helped keep them power for so long.

If you don’t miss out on these exclusive revelations, keep eye on Mr Monkey Blog over the next day or so.

Last week the Audit Commission, the people who monitor councils, announced the results of the latest Comprehensive Performance Assessment (CPA) of Local Authorities and awarded South Tyneside Council 4-stars council, which means that the council has been judged “Excellent.”

But, alas, CPA is not the panacea which Miss Piggy and the Dominatrix are claiming. In fact, CPA is being abolished at the end of this month, to be replaced by something better. Being graded “Excellent” in a flawed process is better than being graded “Poor.” But the process is flawed, and the the Labour council shouldn’t get carried away.

As the title suggests, Comprehensive Performance Assessment is a comprehensive way of assessing services. But the way that it does so is very much to do with performance statistics, which can mean the targeting of resources to meet targets and tick boxes rather than to respond to what resdients on the street actually want. It’s a flaw which has long been evident yet never been properly corrected.

This is evident in South Tyneside where, for instance, Neighbourhood Services score very highly. The department’s staff do their job well and do indeed hit their targets. But whilst the Audit Commission might judge that there’s success, Mr Monkey wonders if they’d have the same view if they actually lived in the borough and had to deal with litter un-swept, graffiti un-cleaned, and roads un-repaired? Mr Monkey doubt’s it.

These problems aren’t to do with bad staff, there to do with mis-directed money and the result of local people being ignored – CPA doesn’t have anything to say about that.

CPA has always lacked enough emphasis on service user satisfaction, relaying on tightly-worded tri-annual surveys rather than mystery shopping or the experience of councillors. The process has also been far too heavily weighted to national priorities at the expense of local ones, and has put adherence to government wish lists ahead of proper local scrutiny.

But Mr Monkey has learned that a select group of councillors and officers had a private viewing much earlier, yet there was no mention of this in the article. Surely these scroungers haven’t developed a conscounce have they?

The council’s junket held earlier in the week, allowed a select few to enjoy a private viewing of the Flash @ Hebburn from the river without the risk of getting cold, wet, muddy or having to mix with local people who may have questioned them about wasting £150,000 on a dozen lights on 8 metre high columns programmed to flash at people walking along the river, especially when the council has just approved an increase in care charges for the elderly and the cost of their meals.

Mr Monkey can now reveal that this exclusive trip was paid for from the public purse and included the cost of chartering the ferry, food, drinks and taxis to take the ‘leeches’ home.

Council leader Iain Malcolm Miss Piggy and the borough’s Dominatrix, Irene Lucas might want to put their celebrations on hold following last week’s announcement by the Audit Commission that South Tyneside Council is rated a 4 star authority.

Mr Monkey has learned that the Audit Commission and it’s inspectors have become a laughing stock after they announced that Cambridge City Council won top marks for sound financial management and value for money – despite investing £9 million in Icelandic banks and a potential loss of £618,000 on Cambridge Folk Festival ticket sales.

The top score of four marks was awarded by the Audit Commission for the council’s use of resources and it was one of the 13 top performers in the country.

Council leader Cllr Ian Nimmo-Smith said: “The Audit Commission is aware of the financial issues in relation to the Icelandic deposits, which affect many councils, and the Folk Festival tickets. I can’t say to what extent they have been taken into account.”

He added: “I’m very pleased the successful way which we run things in Cambridge has been recognised by the Audit Commission. This endorses the recent survey results that showed that residents in Cambridge rated the city council as providing value for- money services at a higher level than other districts in the county.”

At the recent budget setting meeting, Cllr Lewis Herbert, Labour group leader, likened the Liberal Democrats’ management of council finances to a “road crash” with Cllr Nimmo- Smith at the wheel.

He said the Icelandic investment and Folk Festival losses, after an internet ticket sales company went into liquidation, were “self-inflicted”. He said he was surprised the council still received a four-star rating.

He added: “Losing £9 million in Icelandic investments and over £1 million in interest and the Folk Festival tickets represents a shocking failure of the council’s control systems.”

For the second year running, the finance and value for money element of the inspection gave the county council the top score of four.

Cllr John Reynolds, cabinet member for corporate services, said: “I am delighted that our inspection found that the way we manage our budget and spend council taxpayers’ money is of the highest order. We continue to work within an extremely tight financial climate but this score shows we are among the best councils in the country when it comes to financial management.”

These weaknesses are now most evident. For a Council to be declared “excellent” in the same week that it cuts services and raises taxes, and in the same year that it slashes staff pay, is crazy.

The Council have released a special issue of their staff newsletter to congratulate everyone on the achievement.

At the top of the list of high performing services are the Revenues and Benefits service, who deal with Council Tax payments and the administration of benefits to the needy. They too have received a top 4 star rating and yet a mixture of bad laws, bad government and crazy local decision making has seen many of the staff in that department lose a crushingly large proportion of their salary this year.

There’s nothing about this in the congratulatory press releases issued by the Council, the Audit Commission and the government.

There can only be one winner this week following his fuckwit comments made at another Labour party council bash in the town hall.

Mr Monkey can reveal that the Labour party had another do in the town hall last Friday at the taxpayers expense and all the usual scroungers were in attendance including Miss Piggy, aka Iain Malcolm and his lackey Mr Dumpy, aka Papa John Szymanski editor of the Gazette.

Bloggers stupid enough to waste 42p on the local snooze paper can’t have failed to have noticed that editorial control has been handed over to the local Labour party their minister of propaganda Linda Fothergill.

Mr Monkey can confirm that the takeover has finally been completed at a ceremony last Friday when Papa John sat at the top table and was given a plate of his favourite sausage rolls as a reward for all his dedication and hard work on behalf of the party.

Before formally accepting the keys to the Papa John’s office, Miss Piggy acknowledged Mr Dumpy’s achievements and praised him for his outstanding and unbiased reporting and told the assembled crowd of scroungers that it was with some regret that he had decided to change the name of the Shields Gazette to The Labour Gazetteer.

Cum on Miss Piggy if you are that desperate to feel his Papa John’s arse you should have just asked him, there was no need to lick it.

Yes you’ve guessed it – The Twat Of The Week is council leader Iain Malcolm affectionately known as Miss Piggy.